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| Afghanistan/South Asia |
| East and West part in Kabul as aid workers live the high life |
| 2004-10-06 |
| THE Elbow Room bar is the place to be seen sipping cocktails, while the Gator club and restaurant offers a fine range of caviare and Cuban cigars. For brunch, why not linger over an imported cappuccino at the Flower Street cafe, and if you're still feeling delicate from the night before, there's a Thai massage available at $25 (£14) an hour. But this is not a chic metropolitan corner of Edinburgh or London. Welcome, instead, to central Kabul where, in a land still very much part of the ancient, Muslim East, an influx of foreign aid workers has brought the pamperings of the 21st century, liberal West. Three years after the Taleban finished pushing life back to the Middle Ages, the clock has wound forward with equal speed as Kabul sees a plethora of stylish restaurants, bars and night spots catering to Western tastes - and foibles. Despite the odd car bomb, rocket attack and threat from Taleban remnants, the Lai Thai restaurant apparently has some of the best spring rolls outside Bangkok, while at the German-run Deutscher Hof, a mini-version of the beer-swilling Munich Oktoberfest has just got underway. And for those who overdo it, either in work or play, a trained counsellor from Chicago offers personal analysis sessions - and twice-weekly Alcoholics Anonymous meetings. But with most Afghans struggling beneath the poverty line, the birth of "Islington-on-Kush", as one aid worker dubs it, has not been universally welcomed. Among locals especially, criticism is now mounting that the country's estimated 2,000 aid agencies and non-governmental organisations - NGOs - spend too much time and money enjoying themselves and not enough on those they are here to help. "Most will not give ten Afghani [11 pence] to a beggar, but they will spend a hundred times that on an evening out," said Najeem Massoud, a taxi driver. |
| Posted by:tipper |
| #4 I was being a bit silly, Super Hose. I have to admit that I've never seen real poverty -- my husband won't let me join him when he goes to places like India because he thinks I'll get too upset, and try to take care of them all (I still cry over the stray kittens he won't let me adopt). We do get an unfair rap -- I know I never swilled champagne and caviar in front of starving locals, or at home either -- but they see American TV shows and movies, so they don't need real Yanks to get mad at. Besides, hating and despising America[ns] is the international sport -- reality has never entered into it. The only justice here is continuing to do more, better, faster and cheaper, and seeing them choke on their bile as they buy it. And, when we colonize other worlds, most will be from the U.S., because we like doing things like that. I hope that isn't too bitchy for you! |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2004-10-06 8:59:13 PM |
| #3 TW, don't I know. I have been to a bunch of places and seen real poverty. What I mean is: isn't this the type of extravegant activity that Patty Murray and her ilk say breeds hatred in the 3rd world against Americans. Yet its never the Americans getting the Thai massage. We get the rap but not the massage. Where's the justice? :-) |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2004-10-06 4:56:58 PM |
| #2 C'mon, Super Hose! In America poor people have televisions, homes, more than one change of clothing, and are fat. In India, poor people don't even have their own piece of sidewalk, and a decade ago 70% of the population was economically uninvolved. Even our poor are extravagantly wealthy ;-) |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2004-10-06 10:13:18 AM |
| #1 It confuses me to no end when Americans get a bad rap for alienating the downtrodden with our extravegant life-styles. Couldn't they have just installed a Blockbuster and rented movies? I guess it's good for the local economy eventhough the actions of these people re-inforce everything that the Taliban taught about Westerners. |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2004-10-06 3:41:39 AM |